No. I.]

RIPE FRUIT.

LUTHER.

[ONE PENNY.

tossed to and fro by winds from the four corners of the earth.

If the law is rightly understood, it will cause trembling and despair; and if it is not, it will produce hypocrisy.

Faith and hope cannot be separated; they are like the two cherubims over the Mercy seat.

Our enemies threaten us with death; but if they were as wise as they are foolish, they would threaten us with life.

If we would put on Christ as a garment, he will wash and cleanse us with crosses. He will not allow a dirty dress.

The Bible is my mirror, in which I see what I was in Adam, before the fall -what I became by the fall-what I am and should be in Christ now, and what I shall be through eternity.

OUR HIGH PRIEST.

HEBREWS V, 2.

How ineffably precious must the Lord Jesus Christ be to that soul, who by faith views him, as "one who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way. I grant the words before us are not spoken of Christ, but of his type; yet they most surely may serve to represent him to us. For if frail men, Messiah's types who officiated in the office of high priests, were to be qualified with this peculiar disposition to fit them for their office; to be such who could and were disposed to have compassion on the ignorant and those who were out of the way; surely the antitypical Aaron, infinitely transcends them in these qualifications! The person of Christ as God-man, mediator, is wonderful! "The brightness of his Father's glory, and the express image of his person," in whom, and by whom, all the love, mercy, and grace of the essential Three was to be manifested to the very utmost. The essential Son of God became true and very man, God and man in one Christ, that the love of the Godhead might shine forth in its fullest splendour, and the highest instance and evidence be given of it to the elect in their fallen state and sinful circumstances. The love of Christ to his people is infinite! From everlasting to everlasting, it is one and the same invariable act. It admits of no increase, nor decrease. It is eternal, invariable love! That full vent might be given to the out-goings of it, the Son of God left his throne of majesty, the bosom of his Father, laid aside the glory he had with him before the world was, came down from heaven, and for us men, and for our salvation became incarnate, and was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth. The human nature of Christ was framed by the Holy Ghost, to be a proper instrument for God the Son to perform the work of obedience and suffering, and to express in it to his people, all the mercy and compassion of God. The heart of Christ was large enough to contain all the love of God, with the whole of its manifestative fulness to the whole body of the elect. The

bowels of Jesus were capable of containing the whole fulness of God's manifestative mercy, and from Christ, God-man, as the ordinance of grace and salvation, all the blessings thereof were to flow forth abundantly. O stupendous grace! the Father's co-equal and co-eternal Son veiled his glory, clothed himself with flesh and blood, came into our world by his open and visible assumption of our nature, addressing his Father thus: "A body hast thou prepared me, lo, I come,

delight to do thy will, O God." Well might all the angels in heaven start from their thrones, leave them, and descend to earth, beholding with inexpressible admiration their Creator and eternal King, wrapt up in the rags of our mortality! No wonder they sung, "Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth, good will towards men," when Immanuel, whose nature, personality, love, mercy, and salvation, is a confluence of holy wonders, was seen by them, in the likeness of sinful flesh! It is an essential truth, confirmed by the joint suffrage of the whole Bible, that Christ is Jehovah, self-existent, and all-sufficient, the true God, and eternal life. It is impossible for us to exalt him to high, he being "God over all, blessed for ever. Amen." Yet when we consider him in his Godhead, we must not overlook him as a suitable Saviour for us. If we would view him as the Christ of God, we must behold him as God-man, and consider him as God dwelling personally in our nature which he took into subsistence with himself. Then his being a partaker of our nature will encourage our approach to him, whilst his eternal Godhead will give us sufficient cause, and his immutable word sufficient warrant to trust in him, which we may do with safety, because it is written, "blessed are all those who put their trust in him." And here let me intreat you to view this Prince of peace, his taking our nature, state, and condition, that therein he might in his own person undergo all the miseries of life, taste and experience all sorts and kinds of afflictions and temptations, and experience in his own body and soul the whole curse due to sin. Though our Lord did not represent us in his incarnation and birth, yet he became incarnate and was

born for us. He took with our nature all its sinless infirmities, and as he was bone of our bone, so he became like unto us in all things, sin only excepted. He was clothed with a body of frail mortal flesh, and was the subject of all the sinless infirmities thereof; he passed through our state, exposed to the very same trials, afflictions, temptations, and miseries with

us

He was the subject who was charged with all the sins of his people. He felt the weight and burden of them, he saw clearly the venom and demerit contained in them. His understanding had a clear and full apprehension of each and every one of them: and though he could not feel guilt in the way we do, yet he so far experienced it as to be in this, as well as in other respects, tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. His whole life was made up of a loss of his personal glory, an eclipse of his person: he was a man of sorrows, and acquainted with griefs. He sustained more misery in his own person, than can ever befal the whole creation. Nor did his people ever experience any, but Christ drank of the same cup though he was never miserable under any of them, because his being in a condition capable to experience them, was the fruit of his own voluntary engagements with his Father on the behalf of his chosen. He was tried with temptations from the world and the devil as his people are. Does Satan tempt any of them to doubt their sonship? He assaulted Christ with, "If thou be the Son of God." Does Satan tempt any of them to murder? Christ their Lord was tried with the same temptation.

Do any

of them experience the hidings of their heavenly Father's countenance? So did Christ to an inexpressible degree, so that he cried out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Are any of them plunged in deep waters of soul distress? Do they cry out of the low dungeon? Christ was in such a state and case as to say, 66 All thy waves and storms are gone over me. Thy fierce wrath goeth over me, thy terrors have cut me off" Must they pass through the grave and gate of death? Christ hath passed through before them, and by his death he hath abolished death, and by his rising to life again, hath restored to us ever

lasting life. Oh! what infinite compassions, what depths of mercy, what boundless grace, what matchless love is Jesus Christ the subject of! O, Christ is as ready to forgive sin, as it is natural to you to be sinful. And oh that ye could but apprehend this blessed truth, that Jesus Christ is just exactly what you as poor sinful people need him to be. He can have compassion on the ignorant, on such as have lost their way to heaven, and know not their right hand from their left in scripture matters. Some of you it may be, though under some influence of the Holy Spirit, yet know not what ye want. Ye think ye would fain be saved by Christ, yet you know not how to come to him. Ye feel some emotions and desires after him, yet ye cannot tell, it may be, how to express them to Christ, nor to such as ye think belong to Christ. When ye would pray, it may be, you cannot utter your desires at the throne. When ye read the word, it may be, ye complain ye cannot understand it. of good cheer, beloved; Jesus, the compassionate Saviour esteems it his glory to prove to a demonstration that he can have compassion on the ignorant. Come and give up thyself to him, for teaching, pardon, salvation and life everlasting. He saith, "Ask and ye shall have, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you." He teacheth and makes the simple wise unto salvation. He is every way qualified for his office, which is to preach the gospel to the poor, to bind up the broken-hearted, to comfort all that mourn.

Be